The services are programs that are generally designed to run in the background and that the user does not directly interact with (unless they choose to modify their configuration or startup). Despite the fact that this is a term that sounds like server-oriented operating systems to many, the reality is that they are also found in desktop Windows.

Services in Windows operating systems intended for the desktop they are in charge of executing or commissioning a large number of functions and tasksincluding login management, web account management, automatic time zone updates, remote access, network connectivity, power policy management, operating system fax service, as well as Xbox accessory management.

But Microsoft isn’t just rolling out services in Windows, but as a user installs things, they’ll be able to see more coming from elsewhere. For example, here we highlighted the Spice driver service, which on GNOME Boxes (virtual machines) is responsible for allowing the QXL graphics driver and the VDAgent service to improve performance and dynamically adjust the resolution depending on the image size. .window. If you have Firefox installed, you should see Mozilla’s maintenance service.

To add a service, it must be installed and registered with Windows in a process that requires an administrator account. If the user does not allow the installation of the application under administrator conditions, he will not be able to create a service that would allow it to run in the background. This requirement is usually very easy to meet in a Microsoft operating system, but it is still a detail that needs to be taken into account.

Windows Services Panel

Windows has a graphics panel with which system services can be configured. Accessing it is as simple as opening the Start menu, searching for “services,” and clicking the Services app.

Users with a more advanced profile may prefer to open through the app Runwhich can be launched using a keyboard shortcut Windows+R. Once you have a window in front of you, you must enter services.msc and click the OK button or the enter key.

This allows you to access the Windows Services panel, so we’ll explain how to manage them in a basic way.

Basics of managing services in Windows

After opening the service panel, the user will see in front of him a long list of things that are mostly pre-installed, and others that have been supplied from the outside, either through an application or an update.

It is important to pay attention to unless it’s clear what you’re doing, it’s best not to touch anythingbecause tampering with something sensitive into the system can lead to disastrous consequences, so for safe experimentation we recommend running Windows on a virtual machine, a secondary machine that can be sacrificed, or create a restore point first.

After revealing the measures that need to be taken, we will explain how to handle Windows services in a basic way for those users who are interested in optimizing the operating system a bit, since any inactive service means that resources are freed and not consumed.

In our case, we will take the Windows Event Collector as an example. When you right-click on it, a context menu will appear with the following options: Start, Stop, Pause, Resume, Restart, All tasks (this is a submenu), Refresh, Properties (which allows access to all options) and Help.

Here we encounter a fairly self-explanatory situation. Start, Stop, Pause, Resume, and Restart are literal actions that are applied to a service. In general, the Start, Stop and Restart options are of course available.

However, manipulating the service through the context menu will only affect the current system session. This means that if you shut down and restart (or simply restart) the service will return to its default state. If you want to definitively modify the status of a service, go to its properties (also double-click on the service) and select one of the startup options in “Startup type”, where it is also possible to disable it completely to prevent it from starting under any circumstances.

The first type, “Automatic (delayed start)”, causes the service to activate automatically after the system boot time has elapsed, which is very useful for those that are secondary and may not be available automatically. Automation is in charge of starting the service immediately at system startup, while Manual operation is what we have shown about service states through the context menu, which can also be done from the “Service Status” section under Properties.

Simple handling of Windows services using PowerShell

Windows services can also be managed using CMD or PowerShell, although we preferred to use only the latter. Managing services using the command line requires administrative privileges, which can be easily enabled using the context menu (right mouse button) after finding the appropriate application from the Start menu.

Managing services through the command line is something that is still standard in today’s Linux, and although it is a bit difficult to learn at first because it is less intuitive than the GUI, once you get the hang of it, it makes simple tasks faster. Listing all services is as easy as typing Get-Service and press enter.

Obviously listing services like this is impractical, so we’ll narrow down the search to find the service we manipulated graphically earlier: the Windows Event Collector. To do this, we will run the command that appears below, which will display all services whose “Display Name” field begins with the word “Collector”. For those who don’t know staris a wildcard that allows you to fill in the remainder with any combination (including the absence) of characters

Get-Service -displayname "Recopilador*"

, which can consist of letters, numbers and spaces. It is possible to place several, before, after and in the middle of the search term, and narrow or expand the options. At least on the Windows 10 instance used by this server, Windows Event Collector is the only service that matches the search criteria. At this point the user mustleave whatever appears in the “Name” field. Wecsvc ,

The name of the Windows service you want to manage through PowerShell Since the service is running, let’s go stop it

Stop-Service -Name Wecsvc

in the following ways: For Start

Start-Service -Name Wecsvc

the service will use the word “Start”: pause or dismiss

Suspend-Service -Name Wecsvc

service: Restart

Restart-Service -Name Wecsvc

service with PowerShell on Windows: Prohibit

Set-Service -Name Wecsvc -StartupType disabled

service for the following startup:

Stop-Service -Name Wecsvc -force

Set-Service -Name Wecsvc -Status stopped -StartupType disabled

Stop the service and disable it: authorization

Set-Service -Name Wecsvc -StartupType automatic

service to manage it manually:

Set-Service -Name Wecsvc -Status running -StartupType automatic

To enable the service and start it:

conclusion

Computers are chronically overloaded, so it is unlikely that the average user would feel the need to disable services to improve performance. However, not everyone wants or can upgrade their PC, so if you’re running Windows 10 on an older PC (Windows 11 is in a league of its own), it never hurts to take a look at our list of services you need to disable. the things you don’t want are simply hoarding resources for nothing.

Disabling the right services can improve system responsiveness by freeing up resources, which is useful for example when running a demanding application on a machine that is barely running.